The Descendents of Abraham - Genesis 25:12-28
INTRODUCTION:
When we left Genesis just a little over a year ago Isaac had just married Rebekah and then in the first 11 verses of chapter 25 we read Abraham’s obituary and Last Will and Testament. This morning we want to pick up where we left off and like many of the places in Genesis when there is a shift of characters we find a genealogy.
For example in chapter 5 we had the record of the generations of Adam, a genealogy from Adam to Noah, following that we had the history of Noah and the flood. In chapter 10 we had the record of the generations from Noah through his three sons. In chapter 11 we had the record of the generations of Shem to Abraham. Beginning in verse 12 of chapter 25 we have two genealogies, both are the descendants of Abraham. First, we have the genealogy of Ishmael, then once that genealogy is given we leave Ishmael and his descendants behind and we turn to Isaac the son of promise, the promised seed of Abraham through whom God would make a great nation and through whom the promised Messiah would come.
SCRIPTURE:
Genesis 25:12-28,
“Now these are the records of the generations of Ishmael, Abraham’s son, whom Hagar the Egyptian, Sarah’s maid, bore to Abraham; and these are the names of the sons of Ishmael, by their names, in the order of their birth: Nebaioth, the firstborn of Ishmael, and Kedar and Adbeel and Mibsam and Mishma and Dumah and Massa, Hadad and Tema, Jetur, Naphish and Kedemah. These are the sons of Ishmael and these are their names, by their villages, and by their camps; twelve princes according to their tribes. These are the years of the life of Ishmael, one hundred and thirty-seven years; and he breathed his last and died, and was gathered to his people. They settled from Havilah to Shur which is east of Egypt as one goes toward Assyria; he settled in defiance of all his relatives. Now these are the records of the generations of Isaac, Abraham’s son: Abraham became the father of Isaac; and Isaac was forty years old when he took Rebekah, the daughter of Bethuel the Aramean of Paddan-aram, the sister of Laban the Aramean, to be his wife. Isaac prayed to the Lord on behalf of his wife, because she was barren; and the Lord answered him and Rebekah his wife conceived. But the children struggled together within her; and she said, ‘If it is so, why then am I this way?’ So she went to inquire of the Lord. The Lord said to her, ‘Two nations are in your womb; And two peoples will be separated from your body; And one people shall be stronger than the other; And the older shall serve the younger.’ When her days to be delivered were fulfilled, behold, there were twins in her womb. Now the first came forth red, all over like a hairy garment; and they named him Esau. Afterward his brother came forth with his hand holding on to Esau’s heel, so his name was called Jacob; and Isaac was sixty years old when she gave birth to them. When the boys grew up, Esau became a skillful hunter, a man of the field, but Jacob was a peaceful man, living in tents. Now Isaac loved Esau, because he had a taste for game, but Rebekah loved Jacob.” (Genesis 25:12–28, NASB95)[1]
THE RECORDS OF THE GENERATIONS OF ISHMAEL (Genesis 25:12-18)
If I had to pick one over-arching theme for these two genealogies it would be the faithfulness of God as seen in the fulfillment of His promises. Even though the records of the generations of Ishmael have no mention of God, He is still seen in this genealogy fulfilling promises that He made to Hagar and to Abraham. The people of Ishmael move away from the land of Canaan and settle south and east of it in what is today parts of Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and Iraq from these countries you can understand the peoples that developed from them, these are many of the Arab nations that we hear of in the news. For the most part they were idol worshippers and followers of many different false gods. Islam or the Muslim religion did not begin until the 6th century AD. The Ishmaelites were not followers of God, even though Ishmael would have learned of God from Abraham. For the most part the Ishmaelites represent for us the world who has no regard for God and lives life without fear of God and lives life only for themselves. But even in the secular world God is working even though it may be unseen, and God was working among these people to fulfill the promises He had made not to them but to Abraham and Hagar. Let’s take a few minutes to look at those promises and see how God fulfilled them.
In Genesis 17:5 the Lord promised to make Abraham the father of many nations and the Lord had promised Hagar, when she was met by the Angel of the Lord, and Abraham that He would multiply the descendants of Ishmael, that God would bless him and make him fruitful and make from him a great nation. God also promised Abraham that Ishmael would be the father of twelve princes and in verse 16 we read of this fulfillment, “These are the sons of Ishmael and these are their names, by their villages, and by their camps; twelve princes according to their tribes.” (Genesis 25:16, NASB95)[2] Each of Ishmael’s sons was a tribal chief or prince and ruled over their tribe which consisted of their children and their wives and then any slaves or servants that they may have acquired. Each tribe may have consisted of a number of villages and then the word translated “camps” is a word that the King James Version translates as castles. The word itself means an encampment that is arranged in a circular defensive position and protected by a stone fence or wall, somewhat like a fortress where the tribe could come and make a last stand should they be attacked. The word translated “tribes” is a word that could also be translated as “peoples” or “nations.” It is a word that speaks of how fruitful these descendants of Ishmael were and how God was faithful in keeping His promises to Abraham and Hagar.
When Hagar was met by the Angel of the Lord when she was fleeing from Sarah, the Angel of the Lord made one other prediction about Ishmael that concerned his descendants as well. The Angel of the Lord said, “He will be a wild donkey of a man, His hand will be against everyone, And everyone’s hand will be against him; And he will live to the east of all his brothers.” (Genesis 16:12, NASB95)[3] We see this also fulfilled in that they had to have protective encampments and because of the final verse of this record which says, “They settled from Havilah to Shur which is east of Egypt as one goes toward Assyria; he settled in defiance of all his relatives.” (Genesis 25:18, NASB95)[4] Throughout the history of the Arabic nations there has been infighting among them and there must have been squabbles between the princes and their tribes over land. Their hand has always been against their brother Israel and his claim on the land, this is the only thing they can agree on. God was faithful to do for Ishmael what He had promised and Ishmael lived to the age of 137 and then he breathed his last and died. This is the last that we hear about Ishmael at length, he shows up occasionally but he and his family are no longer primary characters in the history that God has given us and in verse 19 we are taken to those who will be the primary characters because they are the ones to whom the promise was given, the descendants of the covenant that God made with Abraham.
THE RECORDS OF THE GENERATIONS OF ISAAC (Genesis 25:19-28)
Moses, the author of Genesis, now turns to the records of the generations of Isaac, the promised son, the seed of Abraham who inherited the covenant promises of the land and of becoming a great nation and the spiritual side of the covenant that God would be his God.
The record begins by telling us that Abraham was the father of Isaac, reminding us that Isaac was the miracle son, the son of Abraham when he was old and when Sarah was past the age of child bearing. This was the one who God promised would become a great nation. The passage goes on to tell us that Isaac married Rebekah and we are reminded who Rebekah is that she was the daughter of Bethuel, who is the nephew of Abraham, the son of Abraham’s brother Nahor. We are also told that she was the sister of Laban who becomes an important character in the history of Isaac and Jacob. This is the second time we see his name, we met him the first time when Abraham’s servant went to Paddan-Aram to find a wife for Isaac. We are told that Isaac was 40 years old when Rebekah became his wife.
In this records of the generations of Isaac we see also the faithfulness of God to the son of promise. Like Sarah, Rebekah also was barren, and knowing the promises that the Lord had made to Abraham and knowing that he was the son of promise, the covenant child that God had promised to give to Abraham, the one through whom the nation would come through, the one through whom the promised Messiah would come, all this must have this weighed heavy on Isaac as the years passed and they had no children. We are told that Isaac prayed to Lord for Rebekah, prayed that God would open her womb and give them a son, prayed earnestly for almost 20 years. Unlike Ishmael, Isaac had faith, he believed the promises that God had given to his father Abraham. He had seen the faith of his father, he had heard how God answered prayer, he had witnessed the ram caught by its horns in the thicket as he lay bound on the altar and he saw how that ram became his substitute. Isaac believed God and called out to Him on behalf of Rebekah, possibly in those prayers he remembered God’s promises and asked God to fulfill them. This record tells us that the Lord heard His prayers and He opened Rebekah’s womb and she conceived. God was showing Isaac like He had shown Abraham that these promises could only be fulfilled by God, there had to be supernatural intervention by God for the promises to be fulfilled. Isaac did not wait as long as Abraham, but he did wait patiently on the Lord for twenty years. The record tells us that Isaac was 60 years old when the babies were born. Babies, that’s right when God intervened and opened Rebekah’s womb and she conceived she conceived not one, but two children, twins.
We are told that it was not an easy pregnancy, the children in her womb struggled together; even before they were born they did not get along. Rebekah was troubled by this and it says that she inquired of the Lord. How she did this we are not told, but she asked the Lord for answers and the Lord answered her. “The Lord said to her, ‘Two nations are in your womb; And two peoples will be separated from your body; And one people shall be stronger than the other; And the older shall serve the younger.’” (Genesis 25:23, NASB95)[5] God told her why this struggle was going on in her womb, there were two nations that would come from these two babies, two different peoples that would not be the same; they would be different from one another. One of the nations would be stronger than the other, and at first it appeared that it would be the firstborn who be stronger, but God was not speaking of the firstborn, the stronger one would be the one who would be the father of the nation that God had promised Abraham, and had promised Isaac. The older shall serve the younger, God had made his choice, it would not be the first born who would be the son of the promise, who would inherit the covenant promises, it would be the second born. The firstborn should have the birthright and he is the one that should become the master of the house when the father dies and receive a double portion of the inheritance, the firstborn should be the son of promise. But God chose the younger to rule over the older, Paul tells us that this is God’s right simply because He is God. Paul writes, “And not only this, but there was Rebekah also, when she had conceived twins by one man, our father Isaac; for though the twins were not yet born and had not done anything good or bad, so that God’s purpose according to His choice would stand, not because of works but because of Him who calls, it was said to her, ‘The older will serve the younger.’ Just as it is written, ‘Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.’” (Romans 9:10–13, NASB95)[6] The younger was chosen by God’s sovereign choice, not because of anything the sons had ever done, the choice was made before they were born. Before you say that is unfair, remember what Isaiah wrote quoting the Lord in Isaiah 55:8-9, “’For My thoughts are not your thoughts, Nor are your ways My ways,’ declares the Lord. ‘For as the heavens are higher than the earth, So are My ways higher than your ways And My thoughts than your thoughts.’” (Isaiah 55:8–9, NASB95)[7] We must never try to second guess God’s sovereign choice, He always knows what He is doing and He has never made a mistake because He is perfectly holy.
Rebekah never forgot what the Lord told her that day and when the day of birth came the firstborn came out with red hair all over his body like a hairy garment and he was named Esau which means “hairy.” The second born we are told came out with his hand holding onto his brother’s heel and he was named Jacob which means “heel-grabber” and came to mean someone who deceived or sought to trip up others with deception for their own gain. This becomes true of Jacob, but in the end the same happens to him.
We are told that Isaac was 60 years old at the birth of his sons, 20 years he had prayed and waited on the Lord for the promise made to Abraham to be carried on through him, whom had been called the promised son.
We are told that those babies grew up and were very different from one another. Esau became a skilled hunter of wild game, and was a man that loved to be outdoors and out in the field. Jacob on the other hand was a gentle, peaceful, quiet kind of man, who was somewhat a homebody, he liked to stay around the tents where they lived. To look at them from the outside it would seem that the older would be the stronger, he was a man’s man; the younger would be the weaker, a mama’s boy, but that was not to be the case. God had chosen Jacob to be the covenant child and God would be at work in his life. Isaac and Rebekah made the unfortunate choice of choosing favorites among the boys and I can assure you the boys knew this. Isaac loved Esau because he was a hunter and Isaac loved the taste of wild game. Rebekah loved Jacob obviously because of what God had told her before the boys were born and I believe that she never forgot that the Lord said that the older would serve the younger and I believe she told Jacob that as well and never allowed him to forget it.
CONCLUSION:
This is where we are going to stop this morning. What can we take away from these two genealogies of the sons of Abraham? First and foremost we can see in both genealogies that God is faithful to His promises. We can find promises made by God throughout the Scriptures and God’s faithfulness in fulfilling the promises made concerning Ishmael and Isaac gives us confidence that God will keep all of His promises. God’s greatest promise was the coming of the most important promised Son, His Son who would come through the line of Abraham. God kept this promise as well, and His Son Jesus Christ was born. He came to save His people from their sins, He went to the cross to pay the penalty for our sin, just as the ram caught in the thicket by its horns became the substitute for Isaac, so Jesus became the substitute for us, dying in our place, He was buried and rose from the dead three days later. When we agree with God that we are sinners unable to save ourselves and believe that Jesus is God in the flesh and that He died for us and rose again our sins we are forgiven and we become a part of God’s family and have the promise of eternal life, and Jesus promised to one day return for us to take us to be where He is. Because God is faithful we know that Jesus will keep His promise and come to get us and take us to be with Him forever.
Secondly, we must remember that God’s thoughts and ways are so much higher than ours, we are finite, God is infinite, our thoughts and ways are marred by sin, God’s thoughts and ways are not. God is perfect and holy and His sovereign choice is always right, praise God that He sovereignly chose you to be His child, just as He chose Jacob to be the one to receive the covenant promises. We must never try to second guess God or wonder about His choice, instead just rest in His sovereignty.
[1]New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update. LaHabra, CA : The Lockman Foundation, 1995
[2]New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update. LaHabra, CA : The Lockman Foundation, 1995
[3]New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update. LaHabra, CA : The Lockman Foundation, 1995
[4]New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update. LaHabra, CA : The Lockman Foundation, 1995
[5]New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update. LaHabra, CA : The Lockman Foundation, 1995
[6]New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update. LaHabra, CA : The Lockman Foundation, 1995
[7]New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update. LaHabra, CA : The Lockman Foundation, 1995